


hi-fi sacrifice

by queerlittlething (thezerocard)



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-23
Updated: 2013-07-23
Packaged: 2017-12-21 03:58:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/895518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thezerocard/pseuds/queerlittlething
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The child born during the cry of the eagle is destined to be a Night Vale intern.</p>
<p>This happens more often than you'd expect, as there has been a nest of bald eagles atop the Night Vale General Hospital for about twenty years now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	hi-fi sacrifice

**Author's Note:**

> My favorite kind of fanfiction is exploratory-- and I thought the interns could use a little more time in the spotlight. Namely, WHY WOULD ANYONE EVER BECOME ONE?  
> I think I've figured out why.
> 
> Find me on tumblr as queerlittlething!
> 
> This work can now be found as a podfic by einzwitterion [here. ](http://archiveofourown.org/works/995860)

The child born during the cry of the eagle is destined to be a Night Vale intern.

This happens more often than you'd expect, as there has been a nest of bald eagles atop the Night Vale General Hospital for about twenty years now.

(The Night Vale Pest and Pet Control service, when questioned, replied that bald eagles are a protected species, and thus immune to typical pest control methods, namely poison and military-grade explosives. When the mayor was interviewed about the situation, she replied simply, "Eagles? What eagles? What  _are_ eagles?" and so the nest remained.)

These chosen many tend to go about their childhoods with an easy smile, a skip in their step, and a general happiness born of the fact that their inevitable and unknowable cause of death has become just a little bit, well, more  _knowable._ In Night Vale, even the smallest inkling of how you will eventually perish is a treasure. Night Vale Interns know that they will not be recruited as Boy Scouts, will not be drafted by a vague yet menacing government agency, and can look forward to the kind of rapid job advancement peculiar to a workplace where new positions open every three to five weeks, mostly on account of fatalities.

Intern Gwendolyn still fondly recalls her days in elementary school, reciting the five most painful ways to die in Modified Sumerian as a grammar exercise or singing "Life Is An Active Minefield" along with her classmates. (She still remembers the tune, and hums it quietly to herself in times of stress. The walls like to harmonize.) The educational system, much like the town itself, tends to be realistic about death unless it's in blatant denial. Their first gym class with loaded weapons was both enlightening and expensive, in terms of structural damage and plastic surgery. Her history teacher for three years was the groaning spectre of the previous principal. It was your average American childhood, she's pretty sure. She had a dog and everything. Oh God The Creature Is Back was kind of standoffish, for a pet, but gosh it was fun to watch him gulp down his dinner.

This is her fourth week working at the station. Not a record, but shading towards unusual. Gwen thinks she's mostly slid under the radar so far due to her tendency to become invisible from the waist up when frightened, and the fact that seasoned Night Vale Radio staff know better than to look at or acknowledge something like the disembodied lower half of a young woman. Besides, being the Assistant to the Station Oracle's Assistant isn't exactly well-paid, and tends to get expensive in terms of laundry, but it means that she isn't sent off as often as the Assistant Investigative Reporters or the Expendable Mine Canary Squad. (They were assured at Initiation that the job title is an industry in-joke, but Gwen still isn't sure.) Most intern deaths occur outside of the station. Most intern disappearances occur within the station. Most intern deformations occur in the space between the station and the outside world.

Gwen's going to try and stay inside during work hours. Currently, she's putting the post-divination entrails into separate tupperware containers, which will go into the station fridge, along with a note that reads NOT YOURS BUY YOUR OWN FOOD!!!! in quite vivid pink ink. After this she has to sweep the break room, leech the marmosets, and test every light bulb for non-supernatural flickering before they can shut down for the night. Inside the recording booth, a rhesus monkey is repeatedly beating the microphone against a plush surface. It is a popular program, and lasts until dawn. Most of the staff have gone home, so it's quiet except for the constant shrieking from the Management. She hums. The walls harmonize. The tupperware lids fit neatly and none are left over. All is peaceful.

There is suddenly a noise-- a noise like claws being dragged across a smooth surface, high and piercing and uncanny. The hair on the back of Gwen's neck rises. She frowns, slightly, and looks at the calendar.

"Is it the third already?" she murmurs.

She sighs and opens a cabinet on the other side of a room and pulls out a sawn-off shotgun. It is packed with salt rounds. She pauses for a moment, cocks the shotgun, and fires it at one of the ceiling tiles. A many-legged creature howls and falls to the floor dead. Gwen puts it in the garbage disposal with the others and gets back to her cleaning.

When she was a teenager, she'd had a rebellious phase: going around in bowties, carrying books, defying her mothers and fathers. At the time she'd declared angrily that, eagle or no eagle, she was going to grow up and become an insurance salesperson,  _so there._ It seemed so worldly and exciting at the time. Now, of course, she knows that her place is here. The station and the people in it are familiar to her, and her family is so very proud. She sometimes runs into Cecil, whose voice been a constant presence all her life. The dental plan isn't bad. The work is not difficult, only hazardous, and in this world, what isn't?

The strokes of the broom keep time with her humming. Outside, the sky fades from mauve to lavender, then back, indecisive. Management switches from shrieks to a sinister hissing.

Gwen knows she will die, like everyone else, if she earns it. And she may not know the exact details, but she does know one thing-- she will die for Night Vale Radio, and that is a cause worth evaporating for.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] hi-fi sacrifice](https://archiveofourown.org/works/995860) by [einzwitterion](https://archiveofourown.org/users/einzwitterion/pseuds/einzwitterion)




End file.
